Automotive air conditioning compressors typically include a pressure sensor that reads the refrigerant pressure within the compressor shell. A conventional pressure sensor would include a housing with a pressurizable volume located below a sensor element. In addition, many compressors use a passively acting pressure relief valve to vent excessive refrigerant pressure from the compressor shell. These may be frangible, one time use valves, although spring loaded, resealing valves are generally desired. Conventional, spring loaded high pressure relief valves suffer from the drawback that they tend to open and close at substantially the same pressure, and may oscillate between open and closed positions, rather than staying open long enough to smoothly and continuously vent from a higher to an incrementally lower pressure before closing. The use of separate pressure sensors and relief valves, besides the obvious cost, also creates two potential leak paths out of the compressor shell.